Wednesday 6 May 2009

First thing this morning a very sad sight was before me, as I walked to work through the college grounds, I encountered two CARRION CROWS fighting over the body of a Tawny Owl, a sad sight indeed, as I rarely record this species as it is.

I decided that this afternoon I would spend a couple of hours skywatching over at migrant alley, I took the long route round, through the tree nursery, but apart from a singing WHITETHROAT, nothing was really happening.

I took my seat at 14:30hrs, and was immediatley rewarded with a SPARROWHAWK, good start I thought. The PIED WAGTAILS fed on the seedling maize field, and SWALLOWS zipped past them, a lone HOUSE MARTIN came over and snatched insects from the field surface, and over on the horse paddocks a small flock of LINNETS fed on dandilion seed heads, with them in the paddocks was a flock of spme 30 STARLINGS foraging for prey items to feed their nestlings.

The next Raptor on the list was one of the PEREGRINES, circling high, before moving SW. It was around an hour later that I saw a KESTREL hovering in the distance, but more interestingly, behind it a long way off, I could see a large rapter being mobbed by a crow. I took it to be a Buzzard, but I kept watching it, slowly it got a little nearer, but also higher, and slighly to the NW of me, I kept watching and following it, still closer it came, and I could now see it wasn't a Buzzard - now I was excited! Come on, I begged it, just a little closer, come overhead, but it stayed frustratingly high and to the NW. Occasionally the sun caught it, and I could see it was a pale bird, the wings were thin and made it look gull like, this has to be an Osprey I thought, but the views never got better and I watched the bird go further and further away. I'm 90% sure it was an Osprey, but cannot confirm it, so I can't count it! How bloody frustrating! Maybe an Osprey will be reported by local birders, so if anyone saw an Osprey around 16:20hrs, let me know!

I only got the one photo opportunity today, that was of this SKYLARK, in migrant alley




7 comments:

Monika said...

There was not too long ago an introduced population of skylarks that lived here on the island for several decades.....they all disappeared before I started birding here though, likely taken out by the also introduced foxes. Great shots!

Chris said...

Hi Warren,
This looks like some days where we do not have to much to see :-) or to take photo of something!! Still you saw a quite nice number of species. Here, things are starting too, redwings, starlings and wagtail are feeding their young already!! I even found some nice nest, but did not get that many pictures neither!!

Greenie said...

Warren ,
Real shame about the Tawny Owl .
Another Osprey will come along , be it now or in the Autumn .
Nice Skylark shots .

Anonymous said...

"the one that got away" it happens to us all Warren.

Steve said...

Bad luck Warren....I reckon you will get one in the Autumn...

ShySongbird said...

What a shame about the Tawny Owl. The Skylark photos are beautiful.

ShySongbird said...

Sorry Warren, I meant to say I also loved the beautiful photos of the Song Thrush on your previous post.